Devices that are connected to a network autonomously transmit detected data to a server device or the like, and the server device or the like can thereby implement automatic data collection and device control. Such a service is called Machine-to-Machine (M2M), and the usability of the M2M has attracted attention recently.
As one example of M2M services, electricity meters of houses and buildings are connected to a network, and a server device or the like can thereby collect electricity consumption in real time. Using data collected in this way, a business operator that collects electricity consumption can provide a service to optimize the production of electricity or the like.
When expanding the use of M2M services, it is necessary to consider the case where a plurality of services or applications use data detected in the same device. In order to effectively implement such a case, it has been studied to place a common service control device that controls common functions to be used by a plurality of services and applications together and thereby promote the emergence of new services.
Further, a gateway device is used as a device to aggregate data detected by a large number of devices. The gateway device is typically placed between the common service control device and a plurality of devices.
When providing a service, a server device requests a large number of devices to transmit data. In response to the request for transmission of data, the large number of devices transmit data to the server device at the same time. At this time, each of the devices adds header information to data in order to transmit the data normally. Thus, because a large number of devices transmit data with header information, the network bandwidth usage rate increases. Further, because the server device receives data transmitted from a large number of devices, the processing load increases.
In order to solve the above problem, it has been studied to treat a plurality of devices as one group. For example, by treating a plurality of devices as one group, it is possible to tie data transmitted from a common group together and transmit them in a bundle. This reduces the frequency of data communication, and it is thereby possible to reduce the processing load in the server device.
As an example of treating a plurality of devices as one group, the operation of grouping devices with common characteristics together in the environment where different types of devices are placed is described in Patent Literature 1. For example, a structure that groups devices based on data type (camera data etc.) and a structure that groups movable equipment and fixed equipment into different groups are described therein.